Exploring life on a Vespa Scooter and Royal Enfield Himalayan motorcycle.
Over and over I’m reminded of the effect riding a scooter or motorcycle has had in my life. They have a peculiar power to make it possible to shed dread and angst.
I don’t try to understand. I accept it as true.
This Vespa video is a feeble attempt to capture the experience.
Only four entries into my ten video target to determine if making videos has any utility in my blogging life and I’m behind schedule. My plan was to post every other Monday.
This entry is a quick update on the status of things in my world and a continuing experiment with cameras and microphones as I search for the idea blogging setup for me.
If you like these entries let me know and subscribe in YouTube. I’m not sure why at this point though someone told me it’s important. As I understand it, if I get a million subscribers I can make some money. I think I have to take some of my clothes off though to achieve that number.
Stay safe on the road and in your dealings with the strange new world we’re traveling through now.
Warm weather has me on the road again. The act of riding reminds of the Vespa scooter as therapy. Whatever darkness descended in winter lightens and vanishes like smoke in the wind as I ride along country roads. Everything looks different. Brighter. The light is dazzling. The world is flush with the fragrances of spring. The Vespa works its magic on me.
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Thoughts and Feelings of SummerThe crickets and katydids are deafening as I attempt to write. Even through the drone of tinnitus, a hearing affliction that robs me of some of the high frequency details of life. Night sounds whisper of the flush of summer, the fullness of living things just before they begin their decline. A decline toward the end, to autumn and on into winter. Or just the dog days of summer.
Riding, I feel the changes in my bones, as if genetically programmed, an evolutionary alarm to prepare for the coming cold weather. Strange as the temperature in the morning as I wander toward breakfast pushes past 80 degrees and humidity barely alleviated by the rush of air across my chest as the Vespa moves along the road. The old church in Linden Hall, Pennsylvania, stands silent in the thick air. Something is changing.
Old Apples and Summer DreamsAcross the road at the Rock Hill School is an old, abandoned apple tree heavy with disfigured fruit, victim of insects and weather. Exactly the sort of fruit that sustained childhood adventures as we perched in trees, pocket knives slicing and carving away the bad parts to provide sweet and sour flesh. Last acts of summer before the onset of fall and the return to school.Continue Reading
Announcing a Scooter in the Sticks Photography ShowIn 63 days there’ll be an opening reception for my photography show at the Art Alliance Gallery Downtown in State College, Pennsylvania. It will take place on Friday, August 3, from 5 to 8pm. The show will run from August 3 – 26.
For more details and information (maps, hours, etc.) visit the gallery announcement for the Scooter in the Sticks show.
There. I’ve announced it. I can’t take it back now and really do need to finalize the image selection and start printing. Or order printing. Or figure out how I’m going to bring this all together. When I first agreed to do the show I had over 300 days to work. I’m happy to report my skills at procrastination are alive and well.
The last time I’ve engaged in putting together a collection of this sort was when I did my MFA thesis exhibit 12 years ago. Everything was shot on film and printed on gelatin silver print in my darkroom in the basement. Thousands of photographs were made using a Leica M6 and Zone VI field camera. I didn’t have arthritis yet or suffered a heart attack. Scooter in the Sticks was only a few months old and no one was looking or commenting. Things were just rolling along.
There was a quote at the end of the post about something I was working on:
As I continue working I feel a project emerging from my riding. I just don’t know yet what it is….
Now I know what it is. And in August you will too.
Mark your calendars. I hope you can visit. Look for future posts as I move along in the work.